“Writing on a computer feels like a recipe for writer's block. I can type so fast that I run out of thoughts, and then I sit there and look at the words on the screen, and move them around, and never get anywhere. Whereas in a notebook I just keep plodding along, slowly, accumulating sentences, sometimes even surprising myself.” FeelsWritingLooksI CanSometimesRunningMovingTypeComputerSentencesScreensBlockSurprisingRecipesNotebookWriter's Block Author:Chad Harbach
“To my parents, writing seemed precarious and not the best idea.” WritingIdeasParentPrecarious Author:Chad Harbach
“The effects of MFA programs, and the rise of creative writing instruction more generally, are far more diffuse than people think. Even if you're a writer who has avoided institutions your whole life, you're still going to be reading a lot of writers who have MFAs, and are affiliated with universities.” PeopleIfsThinkingWritingStillsWholeReadingCreativeEffectsProgramInstitutionsUniversityWhole LifeInstructionCreative WritingAvoided Author:Chad Harbach
“It is no fun at all to have been writing a book for seven or so years, especially when you've never published anything before.” WritingYearsHas BeensBookFunSevenWriting A Book Author:Chad Harbach
“A lot of my close friends had tolerantly washed their hands of the whole idea of me writing a book. They had said to themselves, "I don't know what he's doing."” KnowsWritingSaidBookIdeasWholeHandsWriting A BookClose Friends Author:Chad Harbach
“The idea of the writer who writes nineteen novels, with various ups and downs and levels of experimentation, isn't around so much now. There's a focus, I think, on fewer books, with more pressure on each book to succeed. With that there comes, I think, a certain pressure towards shapeliness in fiction. Towards neatness. And I think writers feel that, and it can effect how they write.” ThinkingFeelsWritingBookIdeasCertainLevelsFictionNovelFocusEffectsSucceedPressureVariousFewerUps & DownsExperimentationNineteenNeatness Author:Chad Harbach
“I tended to write the book in these bursts of two or three months at a time. So I would know, or at least feel securely, that for the next few months I was at least going to have a few hours a day.” KnowsFeelsWritingTwoBookThreeNextHoursMonthsThree Months Author:Chad Harbach
“For me, the process always has to be pretty intense. I could never write just two or three days a week. It had to be every day.” WritingTwoThreeProcessWeekIntense Author:Chad Harbach
“I think that it is very interesting to write about a team because a team is a group of people who work in very close quarters and have very intense relationships so - in my days of playing sports, I was very rarely on a team that did not have it's own peculiar dynamic, and you wind up having very intense feelings for good and for bad about these people with whom you spend many hours a day.” PeopleThinkingWritingFeelingsSportsHoursInterestingGroupsTeamWindIntensePeculiarQuartersVery InterestingPlaying SportsIntense Feelings Author:Chad Harbach
“There are things you do when you're writing that are so fun to do it's almost like they're private jokes that are amusing to you but no one else is going to enjoy them nearly as much and you worry you're going to have to take them out in the end.” WritingEndsFunEnjoyWorryJokesAmusing Author:Chad Harbach
